Warning: This post contains spoilers for season seven of Game of Thrones.
In the wake of rabid fan speculation that Bran Stark may turn out to be the Night King in Game of Thrones, Isaac Hempstead Wright — who plays the newly minted Three-Eyed Raven — has cleared up some of the confusion surrounding his character.
During an interview with Vulture, the 18-year-old actor gave his take on why Bran — despite his transformation into one of the most powerful beings in the Thrones‘ universe — isn’t destined to turn to the dark side.
I think it’s less that they’re the same person and more that they’re two of the ancient beings of Westeros. The Three-Eyed Raven has been around for God knows how long, and White Walkers have been reported since the beginning of time. As we’ve seen, they were created by the Children of the Forest, so we can’t get much more ancient than that. Perhaps we can think of it as these are two characters with a huge amount of power, but one is a Frankenstein’s monster who is driven by nothing but hatred and violence. Then there’s Bran, who uses his powers for good. I want to find out why the Night King is so obsessed with destroying mankind. We’ll see whether they have any kind of explanations in the next season.
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Hempstead Wright also provided an explanation for why the all-seeing Bran needed Sam’s help to figure out that Rhaegar Targaryen had wed Lyanna Stark after annuling his marriage to Elia Martell, making Jon Snow a trueborn Targaryen.
The way I understand, it works like Bran has access. It’s like he’s got a Kindle library of every book of everything that’s ever happened in the world. He can access any of it in a heartbeat, but he hasn’t yet sat there and read it all. The old Three-Eyed Raven had a thousand years to sit in that cave to read every single page of everything that’s happened in the universe, and therefore be completely all knowing. Bran isn’t completely omniscient. He can look up anything he wants, but he hasn’t got it all by heart yet.
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